Judgment pronouncement Introduction 1. Just before 13:00 on Monday 14 February 2005, the former prime minister of Lebanon, Mr Rafik Hariri, was travelling in his convoy in Beirut between the Lebanese Parliament and his home, Quraitem Palace. 2. As it approached the St Georges Hotel, near the coast, a massive explosion was detonated. Mr Hariri was killed in the blast. Twenty-one others, including eight members of Mr Hariri’s convoy, and innocent bystanders, also died. Three of the victims died after the explosion, two on the following day, and the third, the Lebanese MP, Mr Bassel Fuleihan, succumbed after lying in a coma for two months. 3. At least another 226 people were injured, some very seriously. People passing in the street and working in nearby buildings sustained terrible injuries. Many buildings were badly damaged. 4. The explosion was triggered by a suicide bomber in a Mitsubishi Canter—a light tarpaulin covered truck, loaded with more than two tonnes of RDX high-grade explosives—that detonated as Mr Hariri’s heavily protected six vehicle convoy passed the St Georges Hotel. The explosives had the equivalent of 2,500 to 3,000 kilograms of TNT. The explosion left a crater in the road over ten metres wide and almost two metres deep. 5. Mr Hariri and his convoy had been under surveillance for some months before his assassination. Those engaged in the surveillance were communicating in the field using three sets of mobile telephone networks. To distinguish the three networks, the Prosecution labelled them as the Yellow, Blue and Red networks. 6. The Red network was the assassination team. The users of the Blue and Red network mobiles communicated only with each other. Another network, labelled as the Green network, of three mobiles, was alleged to have coordinated and monitored all aspects of the operation targeting Mr Hariri which eventually resulted in his death. The Accused, Salim Jamil Ayyash, Hassan Habib Merhi, and the former Accused, Mustafa Amine Badreddine, are alleged to have been the members of this three mobile network. Mr Ayyash is also alleged to have used a Red network mobile. 1 7. In the months before the attack, network mobiles had followed Mr Hariri as he travelled around Lebanon. This included his trips to Beirut Airport, to his villa in Faqra, north of Beirut, to his villa at Naameh, south of Beirut, when he visited mosques and churches, when he met Hezbollah’s Secretary-General in south Beirut, when he went to the Parliament, and when he had lunch and dinner engagements. The network mobiles were also engaged in static surveillance near Quraitem Palace and along some of the routes he travelled. 8. The aim of this surveillance was to obtain information about Mr Hariri’s movements, his security detail, his level of protection and eventually to determine a suitable method to murder him, including finding an appropriate location for the intended attack. Mr Hariri’s convoy was equipped with electronic jammers that would have blocked the remote detonation of any explosive. Thus, a vehicular borne improvised explosive device, or a ‘VBIED’―in the form of a suicide bomber driving a light truck loaded with explosives that he could safely self-detonate―was chosen for the attack. 9. Shortly after the explosion on the afternoon of Monday 14 February, the Al-Jazeera news network in Beirut received calls claiming responsibility for the attack, and saying that a video was in a nearby tree. An Al-Jazeera employee cautiously retrieved the package with a video and a letter from the tree. Three calls were made to Al-Jazeera, with the last being a menacing call exhorting the immediate broadcast of the video. The callers had also first contacted Reuters. Two of the Accused, Hussein Hassan Oneissi and Assad Hassan Sabra, were alleged to have made these calls and to have observed the video collection from the tree. 10. In the video, which Al-Jazeera broadcast later that afternoon, a young Palestinian man, Mr Ahmad Abu Adass, claimed to represent a fundamentalist group called ‘Victory and Jihad in Greater Syria’ and to have executed a ‘resounding martyrdom operation’ against Mr Hariri as an agent of the ‘infidel Saudi regime’. The attached letter claimed that the suicide operation was carried out by ‘the Mujahid, Ahmad Abou-Adass’. The Prosecution termed this as a ‘false claim of responsibility’ for the attack on Mr Hariri. And indeed it was. The group is fictional and Mr Abu Adass did not kill himself in the explosion; he was not the suicide bomber. 11. Mr Abu Adass, a religious 22 year old, disappeared from his home in Beirut on the morning of Sunday 16 January 2005 and his family has not seen him since. Presumably, he is no longer 2 alive. Mr Oneissi and Mr Sabra were alleged to have arranged his disappearance by recruiting him at a mosque in Beirut in the preceding weeks in January 2005. 12. The successful attack on Mr Hariri was carefully planned and implemented. The six core Red network mobile users were responsible for Mr Hariri’s murder on 14 February 2005. 13. The Yellow, Blue and Red network mobile users observed Mr Hariri and his convoy’s movements in the weeks and months before the attack. Some members of the Red network also used Blue and or Yellow network mobiles. On the day of the attack, the Red mobile users observed Mr Hariri’s movements at the Parliament and were present there and near the crime scene shortly before the explosion. They also coordinated the Canter’s movement towards the convoy. The Red network users made their final calls in the minutes before the attack and these anonymous mobiles were never used again. 14. The false claim of responsibility video was aimed at diverting attention away from the true perpetrators. 15. The attack was an act of terrorism that was designed to spread fear among the Lebanese population. It was committed for political and not personal reasons. The Accused 16. The four Accused are Salim Jamil Ayyash, who was born on 10 November 1963 in Harouf, Lebanon, Hassan Habib Merhi, born on 12 December 1965 in Beirut, Hussein Hassan Oneissi, who was born in Beirut on 11 February 1974, and Assad Hassan Sabra, also born in Beirut and whose date of birth is 15 October 1976. A fifth and former Accused, Mustafa Amine Badreddine, who was also known as ‘Sami Issa’—and is alleged to have been a co-conspirator—was born in Beirut on 6 April 1961. All five, the Prosecutor alleged, are supporters of Hezbollah, a Lebanese political and military organisation. 17. The amended consolidated indictment contains nine counts, alleging crimes committed contrary to the Lebanese Criminal Code. The crimes are of conspiracy to commit a terrorist act by means of an explosive device, committing a terrorist act by means of an explosive device, the intentional homicide of Mr Hariri and of the 21 others, the attempted intentional homicide of the 226 people injured in the blast and of being accomplices to these crimes. 3 18. The Prosecutor alleged that each of the four Accused and Mr Badreddine participated in the conspiracy. They had the following roles in the attack: i. Mustafa Amine Badreddine monitored, and together with Salim Jamil Ayyash, coordinated the surveillance of Mr Hariri in preparation of the attack, including the purchase of the Canter. He also monitored the physical perpetration of the attack, and monitored with Hassan Habib Merhi the coordination of the preparation of the false claim of responsibility; ii. Salim Jamil Ayyash, with Mustafa Amine Badreddine, coordinated the surveillance of Mr Hariri in preparation of the attack, including the purchase of the Canter. He communicated with Hassan Habib Merhi in relation to preparations for the attack, including the false claim of responsibility. He coordinated the physical perpetration of the attack and participated in carrying out the surveillance and assassination; iii. Hussein Hassan Oneissi and Assad Hassan Sabra, under Mr Merhi’s coordination, participated in identifying a suitable person to use in a video-taped false claim of responsibility for the attack, namely, Mr Abu Adass. Immediately after the attack, they disseminated statements falsely attributing responsibility for the attack, ensured the delivery of the video and attached letter to Al-Jazeera, and ensured its broadcast. This too was under Mr Merhi’s coordination. Mr Oneissi, additionally and again under Mr Merhi’s coordination, participated in Mr Abu Adass’s disappearance for the purpose of creating a false claim of responsibility; and iv. Hassan Habib Merhi, with Mustafa Badreddine, coordinated the false claim of responsibility and at times was in communication with Assad Sabra for this purpose. He coordinated Mr Oneissi’s and Mr Sabra’s activities in identifying and effecting the disappearance of a suitable person, Mr Abu Adass, who would be used in the video. Immediately after the attack, he coordinated their activities in disseminating statements falsely attributing responsibility for the attack, ensuring the delivery of the video and attached letter to Al-Jazeera and ensuring its broadcast. 19. Mr Oneissi and Mr Sabra, according to the Prosecutor, used their personal mobiles to communicate with each other and Mr Merhi in relation to the false claim of responsibility. These 4 three mobiles were termed the ‘Purple group’ of mobiles. Mr Badreddine, Mr Ayyash and Mr Merhi were alleged to have communicated in a closed three-mobile Green network, in which Mr Ayyash and Mr Merhi used their Green mobiles only to communicate with Mr Badreddine. 20. The Prosecution attempted to prove that they were using their network mobiles based upon the co-location of the network mobiles with their own personal mobiles.